Continuing the tradition
I started last year—specifically, discussing wretched and horrible things
during the month of February—I will spend the next four weeks reviewing DC’s seven-issue
miniseries Identity Crisis, released in 2004.
Now, yes, Linkara
the Great and Powerful sort of reviewed this one in the form of a top 15 list
that detailed his biggest problems with the series. He says he avoided an actual review out of
respect for those readers who still like Identity Crisis and think it was
a good story. Me, I’m not that noble, so
here is a full-blown, step-by-step critique on what makes it so terrible. Because liking something doesn’t make
it not terrible. Trust me, I
listen to “Barbie Girl” for fun.
AND, as with the
comics I reviewed last February, if you feel uncomfortable reading discussions
and depictions of rape, you may want to hang out at Cute Overload for the rest of the month instead of this blog.
Our onerous opus opens in Opal City with Elongated Man, a.k.a. Ralph Dibny, and Firehawk, a.k.a. Lorraine Reilly. They’re staking out an alley, where two teens are planning to sell the contents of a mysterious box to an equally mysterious buyer. Our heroes spend a lot of time wondering what’s in that box, but you shouldn’t waste your time doing the same because after the first half of this issue, it never comes up again. Holy McGuffins, Second-Stringers!
As
they chat, the villain Bolt is sitting on his duff in a nearby car, trying to
get information on the sellers from the Calculator before he goes over to buy
(read: steal) the box from them. The
Calculator is described in the comic as an evil version of Oracle, and that’s
basically all he is: villains call up and pay him for intel on the places and
people they want to attack/kidnap/rob/etc.
I mention this because Calculator is the only part of this intro that
will be relevant later, so keep him in mind.
Meanwhile,
back at the ranch…
That being said,
this part of the issue—the depiction of Sue and Ralph’s relationship—is one of just two things that I will give Meltzer
credit for. I should probably hate it, since it’s
blatantly designed to be as adorable as possible so that you’re a wibbly wreck at
the end of the issue (you’ll find out why soon enough, if you don’t already
know), but it does its job so well!
The first time I read this comic, I didn’t know much about Ralph and Sue
beyond their names, so I can state with some authority that even those who are
completely unacquainted with these characters will sympathize when Elongated
Man gets the call that no husband should have to receive.
There! I managed to praise Identity Crisis without
strangling myself! Next!
The scenes with
Ralph and Lorraine and Bolt are interspersed with snippets of other heroes’
lives thirty minutes in the future.
Superman will be visiting his parents in Smallville. The Atom and his ex-wife, Jean Loring, will
get some legal business done. Green
Arrow will be hanging out with Green Arrow. (Translation: It’s father-son time
for Oliver Queen and Connor Hawke, who is sporting a bowl cut that is
completely inappropriate on anyone not named Moe Howard or Guy Gardner). Each of these generally happy scenes ends
with the heroes receiving a mysterious call delivering very bad news…
Anyway, back
with Ralph and Lorraine.
Aaaand we’ll get more into why that’s stupid in a little bit. Aside from the fact that on the previous page he was talking about how “Sue’s a target” and “Anyone who puts on a costume paints a bull’s-eye on his family’s chests” even though there wouldn’t be a bull’s-eye on anyone’s chests if you kept your dang mask on when fighting crime and oh wait, I forgot. I have to save that speech for later in the month. It is, after all, very unwise to put all of one’s stupid in one issue.
In the meantime, Bolt has finally decided to leave his car and attempt to steal that box, only for the teens to draw guns on him…
It’s during the
shoot-out that Elongated Man gets a distress call from Sue, begging him to come
home and help her. (So much for his nose
twitching whenever there’s a mystery…) He
and Firehawk cut out quick, leaving Bolt bleeding in the alley with one of the
teens, who calls 911.
Our heroes rush
back to the Dibny apartment as fast as they can, but by the time they arrive,
the place has been trashed and half-burned, and Sue has passed on, is no more,
has ceased to be, expired, gone to meet her— *slaps self* We also find out that
Sue was pregnant at the time of her death.
Gee. My emotions don’t feel
crassly manipulated at all.
...after panel of
it. Jeez, even Cry for Justice, a
near-perfect example of disgusting tackiness, had the decency to not actually
show the body.
The moment word
of Sue’s death hits the superhero community, a veritable swarm of capes
descends upon the Dibny household to search for clues. I would have praised this scene as a great
example of superheroes using their brains and being detectives instead of just
punching things… buuut I’m not gonna.
Don’t worry. As with my rant on
Ralph’s identity being public, I’ll have lots to say on this later. I’m sure you can’t wait. Just keep in mind that Batman, Mister
Miracle, the Metal Men, Animal Man, the Ray, AND the Atom (to say nothing of
Doctor Fate and Etrigan, who were apparently called in off-panel) have gone
over the apartment with a comb so fine it’s literally microscopic.
Issue One ends
with Sue’s funeral, which is the other scene in this series that I simply must admire. It’s kind of ironic, given that Sue’s death
was the instigator of this terrible storyline, but the funeral is absolutely
wrenching. I’ll admit that Ralph starts
to look a bit goofy as his shape deteriorates, but if you don’t have the humanity
to feel really effing sorry for him even if you’re snickering, then I don’t
know what to say to you. And honestly,
Ralph losing his ability to maintain a human shape just makes the whole thing a
billion times more depressing. And so, for
the second and final time, I must give praise to Meltzer and Morales. Like, a lot of praise. I can’t even spend too much time reading this
scene because I start tearing up if I do.
Every single time.
Sadly, the
funeral can’t last forever, and before we know it, the heroes are forming teams
and running off to interrogate the various suspects. Since the apartment was burned up, all the
suspects have heat, light, or fire-based powers: Heatwave, Dr. Phosphorus,
Firefly, Bolt… wait, Bolt? Bolt is a
suspect? You mean the guy who Elongated
Man and Firehawk were watching with their own eyes at the exact same time
as Sue was getting murdered across town?
That Bolt? Okay, folks,
covering all the bases is great, but there’s no need to strip search everyone who
comes into the stadium.
Before long,
Green Arrow, Elongated Man, Black Canary, Zatanna, Hawkman and the Atom are the
only ones left at the church. They
gather for a secret club meeting to discuss the man whom they (think they) know
for a fact is behind Sue’s murder—Dr. Light.
It’s not yet explained how they “know” this, though it’s implied that
something happened a long time ago that would make Light want to kill Sue.
That brings us
to Issue Two, which begins with a flashback to about nine minutes before the secret
meeting (yeah, they do that “X minutes till now” thing a lot, with varying
degrees of success). We see the Atom
give Jean a crossbow to protect herself with.
A… crossbow. That crossbow better
shoot lasers or Jean Loring better be the Huntress, because otherwise I don’t
think a crossbow will cut it against someone who could slip in and out of the
Dibnys’ super-duper security system completely undetected.
But uh-oh! What’s this?
Turns out the
Flash—and Green Lantern, while we’re at it—have been spying on our little group
of heroes, and now they demand to know why they’re so sure about Light being
the killer.
Which brings us
to The Scene.
In brief, Dr. Light broke into the JL Satellite, raped Sue Dibny, and in retaliation, the League votes for Zatanna to not only erase his memories of the incident but also to change his personality around, essentially lobotomizing him, so that he can never hurt Sue or any of the other heroes’ loved ones again.
Honestly? There are so many things wrong with this
scenario that I could spend the entire month talking about nothing but this
scene and still not run out of things to say.
One: how did
Light get onto the Satellite in the first place? Because apparently, the Justice League has
absolutely no security whatsoever to detect when intruders teleport or phase in
(precisely how Light broke in is left unclear, but remember that the League has
the tech to detect phasing since it was part of the Dibnys’ home security
system and we later discover that heroes like Etrigan and Doctor Fate
can detect teleporters and magic). Nor
was there a single person on monitor duty.
THAT MAKES SENSE.
Two:
Three: their
motivation for altering Light’s personality goes way beyond questionable, and
this aspect isn’t even brought up. Unless
you’re going to argue that not one member of the League has faced a rapist
before (which is ludicrous, especially for heroes like Green Arrow who fight
street-level crimes on a daily basis), why haven’t they done this to any of the
other rapists they’ve taken down, not even the repeat offenders? Or did they only do it this time because the
rape affected them personally and the rules are allowed to change when their
loved ones are attacked as opposed to anyone else’s? That would certainly explain why Zatanna went
around mind-wiping every villain who discovered their secret identities but has
apparently made no move to use this power to benefit anyone else. “Do as I say, not as I do” indeed.
Four: In the
context of this miniseries, Ralph Dibny has worn two costumes as Elongated Man. One with a mask…
Judging by the fact that he’s wearing the costume without the mask during this flashback, as well as the fact that Light seemed to automatically know Sue’s name, I’m going to guess that Ralph had ditched the whole secret identities thing by this point. I’m also going to guess that the incident with Light was the “just once” that Ralph refers to in the panel above. This is probably a minor thing compared to everything else, but it really ticks me off how Ralph is so casual about this. He was just saying how happy he is to have a public identity, meanwhile, his public identity is part of the reason his wife was raped (that and the Satellite’s incredibly lax security). You’re saying he has no regrets about that whatsoever?
Don’t get me
wrong: I’m not saying he should still be moping about it. I’m glad that he and Sue were apparently able
to move on and be happy after the attack, and I get that it’s years and years after
the fact, but I find it a little difficult to believe that a man who was
talking so tenderly about the love of his life five minutes ago can react not
at all when suddenly reminded of what must have been the worst day of his
and his wife’s lives. And while we’re on
the subject of his wife…
Five: Where
is Sue’s reaction to all this?!! SHE
is the one who was raped. SHE is the one
who had to live with the physical and emotional fallout of this attack. And yet as soon as the heroes subdue Light,
Sue is whisked away to the hospital, never to be seen or heard from again, and
we only get to see the reactions of the big incompetent heroes! Though I suppose there is something to be said for blunt honesty: Meltzer didn’t even try to cover up the
fact that Sue is nothing more than a plot device.
This is almost
exactly the same problem I had with Nightwing #93, which I reviewed last February. (I’m noticing a theme here…)
In Nightwing, the title character is raped by villain Tarantula… and
then we never speak of it again. No,
seriously, it’s never brought up in any way, never mind acknowledged as
something horrible that would have severe psychological consequences. At least in Identity Crisis, if
nothing else, they do acknowledge that what happened to Sue was wrong, but we
don’t see her reaction to the attack any more than we saw Dick Grayson’s. The rape is just sort of thrown in there
without rhyme or reason and frankly, if DC doesn’t want to deal with the
aftermath of rape in a mature, thoughtful way, they should damn well stop
including it in their stories.
Six: The League
voted to lobotomize Light. Fine,
whatever. Except that not every member
of the League was present to cast their vote and voice their opinion. We already know that Superman and Batman were
members at this point. According to the
picture of the League we see later, Firestorm, Aquaman, and Red Tornado were
also members. Elongated Man didn’t
get to vote either; he was at the hospital with Sue. You really think he wouldn’t want a say in
this? Especially given this bit of
monologue from Green Arrow in Issue Three (context: Superman just arrived and our main characters explain that they went after Light without telling anyone to give Ralph the chance to punch him first):
Something like this could ruin bingo night forever!!
I actually have
a bit more to say about this, but to give you the whole spiel now would mean
giving away plot points that haven’t happened yet, so again, we’ll wait.
Back in the
present, the League’s old Satellite is now being used as a sort of occasional villain
hang-out. I hope the League took all the
hi-tech gizmos and weapons they stored up there before leaving. Assuming there were any. Ahem.
Among the
baddies is Deathstroke the Terminator, who’s just hangin’ out bein’ anti-social
until Dr. Light staggers aboard, begging for protection from the Justice
League, even though he shouldn’t know that they’re after him at this point… did
Calculator find out and tip him off? Did
Light overhear the League talking on the rooftop across the street from his house
(because that’s the smartest place to have your exposition dump)? But if that was the case, then their
conversation should have reminded him about the mind-wipe, except that he
wasn’t reminded until Issue Three… oh, whatever. If Meltzer doesn’t care enough to explain,
neither do I.
Anyway, the
League is still telling Flash and GL about the team’s sordid past. They say that Zatanna had no idea what she
was doing when she tried to rearrange Light’s personality and ended up lobotomizing
him by accidentally, thereby turning him into a piñata for the Teen
Titans. And here’s where we start
bumping into problems with the rest of DC continuity. I’ve only read one comic with Dr. Light pre-Identity
Crisis and… he doesn’t act like a piñata.
In New Teen Titans #7, he puts together a team of super-villains,
invades Titans’ Tower, pwns Raven singlehandedly, takes Cyborg’s father hostage
and threatens to kill him if he doesn’t help the bad guys, pwns Starfire, and
is only defeated by some trickery from Robin.
These are not
the actions of a man who got his brains turned to fried oatmeal. He wasn’t a “joke,” as the Flash refers to
him as in the next issue (of Identity Crisis, that is). He was a competent and threatening villain. Heck, even in Identity Crisis itself,
this assessment is inaccurate—Light never acts stupid or incompetent. He finds out the League is looking for him (somehow),
beams himself up to the old Satellite to ask for help, and apparently has
enough cash to hire Deathstroke, one of the most professional and expensive
assassins in the business. Does any of
that sound like the actions of a brain-challenged butt monkey?
I’m sure there
are a billion other examples of comic book reality not meshing with what
Meltzer is trying to convince us of here, but I don’t have time to find them,
especially since I still haven’t pointed out that Light shouldn’t have been a
suspect anyway because… why would he kill Sue?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, he raped her and was mind-raped by the League in
return, but he’s not supposed to remember any of that. So why would he go to the trouble to plan and
execute the perfect murder of a woman whose husband had absolutely nothing to
do with the decision to lobotomize him?
Which he doesn’t remember anyway?
Heck, the whole point of the personality-switch was to prevent stuff like this from happening! Rrrgh. The more I think about
this, the less sense it makes. But hey,
look on the bright side—we’re almost done with the issue!
After spending
however-long chit-chatting on that rooftop, the League finally decides to go
get Light. (Are you sure you guys wouldn’t like to get a latte first? I’m sure cramming that much exposition into a
single issue works up a thirst. And you
are near Boston, a.k.a. the home of two-Starbucks-on-every-street.) Green Arrow reveals that Light wasn’t the
only crook they ever gave Zatanna-style amnesia. And then this happens.
I’m running out
of ways to say that the rape scene makes no sense. Can I say it again anyway? Good, because THE RAPE SCENE MAKES NO
SENSE!!!!
The League knew there was a chance that Sue didn’t die in the fire. “From what we can tell, Sue was killed
by third-degree burns over forty-two percent of her body,” narrates Green Arrow
at the funeral (emphasis mine). They
don’t know for sure. They are the
greatest detectives on this planet and several others. And yet NOT ONE of them thinks hey, we should
wait for the autopsy report or some other form of tangible evidence before creating a list of suspects and running off
to interrogate them. Oh, no, of course
not, because otherwise the subplot with Dr. Light being turned into Mr.
McRapeypants would never have existed at all!
And heaven knows we wouldn’t want to lose such a brilliant examination
of the fragility of the human condition because that’s obviously what it is am
I right?!
And now that I think about it... why does the discovery that Sue was dead when the fire was set let Light off the hook at all? There was still fire involved. Couldn’t he have killed her some other way—strangulation or something—and then lit the fire either as a calling card or to burn up any evidence he may have left behind? Duh?
Now look, I know
that this is supposed to be a mystery and that most good mysteries will throw
red herrings out from time to time to keep things spicy. I like red herrings. Red herrings keep things interesting. Red herrings are groovy and spiffy and lots
of other outdated yet complimentary adjectives.
But red herrings have to make some sort of sense and work well with the
plot. This whole thing with the rape and
Light’s mind-wipe… it doesn’t fit, it just wastes an entire issue with
exposition and flashback, thereby delaying the actual plot. But now that we’ve got that insulting
diversion out of the way, we can move on to the compelling human drama that
made this comic such a massive success Oh Rao I’ve
already read all the good parts haven’t I
Next Time: What’s
that, Justice League? You all want to
take a crack at Deathstroke too? Sorry,
but we’re organizing our fights like a deli now. You’ll have to take a number, wait your turn
and attack him one at a time. No cutting
in line, Flash.
Images from Identity
Crisis #1, Identity Crisis #2, Identity Crisis #3, Identity Crisis #6 and
The New Teen Titans #7
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